Tourism. Trends. Tactics. Technology.

February 18, 2019

For those that have not been following along, the City recently conducted an audit of Visit Dallas. "Scathing" is the word being used to describe the findings. But, to be fair, the audit found just as much wrong with the City's oversight of its contract with the DMO as it did with Visit Dallas. That said, the media is focusing the majority of its attention on the DMO, essentially giving the City a day-pass. It's hard to bang on bureaucrats. Much easier to target the CEO. Lazy journalism at its finest.

This is not unlike what has been happening in Santa Clara, where the DMO is being vilified when the City never set goals or expectations for the organization. And in Stillwater OK. And, in a bunch of places. It is the season, apparently.

Filling potholes, Police and Fire, the Homeless. Insert any hot button part of a City's program of work. It's always designed to position one of the only non-resident tax generators as somehow frivolous against the very programs it helps fund...because Joe and Jill Public are easily led. Smart politicians know this. Ethical ones are handcuffed because they don't have the facts with which to fight back (and, that's on us).

February 14, 2019

The State of Indiana has never meaningfully invested in promoting itself as a destination...which always struck me as odd. After all, they border a State that does...and continues to enjoy national recognition from one of the most successful tourism campaigns in history. One would think that the competitive juices would flow a bit more abundantly.

But, no. Indiana invents less than $5 million a year to invite visitors, investors and potential residents to consider their sensational destination. A head-scratcher, to be sure.

The bill doesn't allocate more revenue (naturally) but could open the way for the new agency to develop new revenue streams.

My only question: Was it a unanimous vote because the concept is brilliant...or because the House is tired of being accused of not understanding the crucial importance of destination marketing on a State's economy and just wanted to wash its hands of the whole affair?

February 07, 2019

His self-defense has a pinch of logic to it...but that doesn't excuse the insane lack of judgment and sensitivity from the Tourism Minister from Uganda.

The other day, Godfrey Kiwanda thought he had hatched a winner. The new tourism campaign would feature "curvy" women. "We decided to use the unique beauty, the curves... (as a) product to be marketed along with what we already have as a country, ranging from nature, the language and food, to make it a tourist attraction," he explained. So, he's supporting a curvy beauty pageant to find the new "face" of tourism.

January 17, 2019

Chalk it up to a great idea that I saw, photographed...but never connected the dots.

We were on a destination assessment assignment in Iowa a couple summers ago when I spotted a farmer selling carrots in a totally different way (click picture to enlarge). One sign read, "Carrots: $2/bunch." The other read, "Ugly Carrots: $1/bunch."

I chuckled and asked the farmer how his strategy was working. He grinned back and said, "I always sell out of the ugly ones first." When I asked what percentage of his crop was "ugly," he replied, "about a third...and I used to throw them away."

A thousand miles away, Abhi Ramesh was learning the same thing. According to the website for his Philadelphia based firm, "Misfits Market," over $1 trillion of food is wasted each year, either getting tossed at the farm, rotting in warehouses or going unsold in stores until it's inedible. Much of this is due to "modern-day beauty standards for food." Ugly fruits, misshapen vegetables, and delicious but imperfectly-sized produce are squandered at every level. Just a quarter of this wasted food could be used to feed the entire starving population of the world.

And that was the inspiration behind Misfits...and, like my Iowa farmer, they sell at up to half off. For $19, they'll ship 10-12 pounds of imperfect fruits and vegetables to your door, enough to feed a couple for a week. A larger box for bigger families is also available for $35. They're starting slowly, rolling out the organic service geographically in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware. Abhi hopes New York is next.

January 03, 2019

For the past decade, news outlets across the land have doubled down on the old adage of "if it bleeds, it leads." In the era of Facebook, stories about crime became delectable clickbait, driving advertising revenue. Nevermind how it positioned a community on a global stage that could now read articles from anywhere in the world. And, nevermind the damage that was done to a community's image in the economic development space. Stories about crime equaled short-term revenue to the media highlighting it.

November 29, 2018

OK...I may be missing something in the translation. But, this article from Travel Pulse certainly sounds like Mexico's new administration is moving ahead with shuttering the State Tourism Office and offloading tourism promotion to the country's embassies around the world.

The most egregious comment first: A City Council member, in voting against his town's Tourism Committee's informed recommendations, said these words: Lodging tax revenues have paid for a lot of advertising, while this (wayfinding signage) is actually something useful for the city.

He obviously hasn't been briefed on The Halo Effect, which clearly indicates that tourism advertising increases the likelihood of entrepreneurial investment in a community (something one would think he would support).

The same article, however, has this same city council member saying wayfinding signs are important because he doesn't own a smartphone.

It's always a problem when elected leaders believe their life experience is shared by their constituents...because it often isn't. Just as members of the Tourism Committee erred by thinking everyone does own a smartphone, as they rejected a proposal to fund wayfinding signage.

Smartphones have nothing to do with the question of wayfinding signage. The real question is whether you have more than one attraction in your community (and Wapakoneta does). Thus, if I'm coming for the Neil Armstrong Air & Space Museum...GPS won't tell me that there is also the Bicycle Museum of America or the Temple of Tolerance. Wayfinding signage does.

Virtually every comment in the article is wrong...but, in the end, the City Council likely did right.

November 08, 2018

As a child, nothing heralded the approaching Holiday Season like mail-order catalogs. Sears, JC Penny's, Spiegel...they were the stuff of Santa dreams. We'd pore over them for hours, identifying the treasures we craved.

And then, they vanished in the new world of the internet.

They're baaaack. And, it should be no surprise who's bringing Holiday Catalogs back...Amazon.